The mandate, which could present significant problems especially for the economics of the traditional meetings and business travel sector, is contained in a report issued after the 6th International Telecommunications Union Symposium on ICTs, The Environment and Climate Change held in Accra, Ghana from 7 to 8 July, 2011.

The meeting was intended as a preparatory session for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference to be held in Durban, South Africa, from 28 November to 9 December 2011 and the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD 2012 or Rio+20) to be held in Rio de Janeiro from 4 June to 6 June 2012.

The document says there is growing recognition of “the increasingly widespread use of ICTs in changing many people’s lives and boosting economic growth.”

It says, “Although ICTs are also a growing contributor to greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions, they also provide one of the most significant opportunities to reduce emissions of GHG, through the application of intelligent ICT systems especially in industries that are major emitters, including energy generation, raw material extraction and refining, manufacturing and recycling, building construction and transport.”

It noted that “ICTs also reduce manufacturing needs by replacing material goods with virtual products, such as online music downloads (and) provide the means for virtual meetings (to replace or reduce travelling), and intelligent transport systems to cut emissions and traffic congestion.

The meeting called on “the ITU in accordance with Article 7.2 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and as the UN specialised agency for ICTs with its membership of 192 governments and more than 700 private sector entities, to lead an ICT coalition urging COP17 (Conference of the Parties) delegates to look to the enormous potential of ICT solutions to cut emissions across all sectors.”

It called upon UNFCCC delegates to make specific mention of ICTs in the negotiating text.

“The adoption of an agreed methodology for measuring the carbon footprint of ICT equipment and its inclusion in National Adaptation/Mitigation Plans, would provide an incentive to the ICT industry to invest in developing countries, help reduce the digital divide, and at the same time help fight climate change – a win-win scenario,” the outcome document said.

In the past few years, leisure travel has benefitted substantially from the improvements in ICTs, especially the low-cost airlines and online travel agencies which have broken the traditional bookings structures long considered to be the exclusive domains of the traditional scheduled airlines and the global distribution systems.

However, travel for business and meetings is believed to be ready for some scale-backs, especially due to executive time constraints and other cost-cutting priorities. Video-conferencing is already coming into wide use.

One website called www.megaMeeting.com is extremely active marketing itself to help businesses conduct more personal and productive meetings through video-conferencing.

It claims the ability to connect several teams located in different parts of the world and give them the ability to do live demos and interactive presentations, hold online seminars, employee trainings and even troubleshoot with customers.

The website is planning to use the service for the planning of major conferences. It hopes to conduct and record a virtual orientation for exhibitors, with the goal to make the recording available for more exhibitors to view.

Last month, the telecommunications service provider Verizon announced that it has concluded an agreement with India’s Tata Communications to extend the range of its immersive video, or telepresence, offering to enable virtual face-to-face collaboration in more locations around the world.

The agreement enables meetings to take place between Verizon’s telepresence customers and any public or private telepresence room on the Tata Communications Global Meeting Exchange, claimed to be one of the broadest telepresence networks accessible today and a gateway to the company’s public room network spanning 31 cities on five continents.

Said the official announcement, “Telepresence replicates face-to-face interactions so realistically that it feels as though everyone is in the same room, even though they may be hundreds or thousands of miles apart. By leveraging collaboration technology to replace in-person meetings, telepresence reduces travel time and cost while reducing the carbon emissions associated with business travel.

“As a result, the service makes collaboration among employees, customers, suppliers and business partners more efficient and economical.”

The announcement quoted Mr Farooq Muzaffar, Verizon vice president of enterprise network and communications solutions, as saying, “Video is the new voice for business, and it’s becoming more and more available to meet the changing nature of work. As businesses expand beyond the traditional four walls of an office building, we’re seeing more of our customers turning to advanced collaboration tools like telepresence for a bigger impact on their overall productivity and performance.”

Expedia shares soared 12.68% to US$25.35 in after-hours trading following the announcement.

TripAdvisor, which was founded in 2000, provides reviews and advice on hotels, flights, vacation packages and other services.

It has sites in 29 countries and its various brands attract more than 50 million unique visitors a month. It opened a regional office in Singapore recently.

The new company will be made up of TripAdvisor and its 18 other travel media and advertising brands, Expedia said.

It said stock in TripAdvisor will be distributed to Expedia stockholders.

Expedia said it expects the spin-off, which will need the approval of shareholders, to be completed in the third quarter of the year.

Expedia purchased TripAdvisor in 2004 for US$200 million.

© 1994-2010 Agence France-Presse

About 400 delegates attended the opening session of the inaugural ASEAN eTravel Mart, in down town Bangkok.

Commenting on ASEAN’s status in technology and tourism he said the two industries had started to work together and “one day we should be ahead as a region.”

He claimed the main challenge lies in the “ability to market ourselves and organise our business using technology to deliver what travellers are really looking for.”

Apichai Sakulsureeyadej

TTA was started seven years ago to draw both tourism and technology companies to work together mainly in education to improve technology capabilities for SMEs.

Described as a humble endeavour, Mr Apichai said the association has since worked with 6000 SMEs related to tourism in Thailand to improve their skills in technology.

“Now we need to grow our association’s efforts to include also ASEAN. Our goals have graduated.”

About 20 million people work in the travel industry in ASEAN, but it is expected to employ 30 million directly and indirectly by 2020.

The TTA president concluded there was a need to strengthen capabilities and capacity building hand-in-hand to grow business across the region.

The event should become a fixture in the annual ASEAN events calendar, but it is understood it will remain in Bangkok in 2012 before moving to other ASEAN cities, probably in 2013.

Citing the importance of technology in the move towards ASEAN community objectives, he pledged government support to strengthen work force skills in the tourism industry and back  technology developments.

“The Merger of tourism and technology helps to grow our economies and reliable connectivity is one of the main pillars of development,” he told around 400 technology and tourism industry representatives attending the meeting’s opening session

Abhisit Vejajiva

At the event,Tourism and Technology Association president, Apichai Sakulsureeyadej, announced  that an ASEAN Technology Standard on Technology had been initiated that would improve online transactions and business for the travel industry across the 10-nation community.

The standard will create an XML interface that could be adopted as the single standard in ASEAN allowing tourism companies to share data live and transaction business between different online platforms.

“The draft has been put in place now,” Mr Apichai explained, while admitting it would take another two years to become a reality in the market place.

Presenting a positive picture of Thailand’s tourism, the Prime Minister said the country had welcomed 15 million tourists last year with earnings of more than Bt500 billion.

“We expect to gain 17 million visits this year and despite challenges the government is committed to stability and supports tourism in the country as well as across the region,” he said.

The prime minister reaffirmed the government’s commitment to support a bid to host the 2020 World Expo in 2020 claiming it would be a first for ASEAN.

According to Abacus data, booking transactions for 2010 ended on a record high, even higher than the pre-recession period back in 2007. This trend appears to support data from other organisations such as the UNWTO that predicts Asia’s tourism industry will surpass North America and Europe within five years.

Abacus reported that booking transactions were up +11% year-on-year from 2009. This coincided with international arrivals into Asia, which was up by almost 13% in Asia. Globally, international tourist arrivals were up 7 % after a 4 % decline in 2009. Growth is expected to continue in 2011, but at a slower pace of 4 to 6%, according to Mr Bailey.

“Despite rising fuel costs and the recent recession, the Asian travel industry has shown its resilience in its quick recovery and strong growth years in both 2009 and 2010. I foresee that 2011 will continue to be a high growth year for Asia, albeit at a slightly slower pace,” he said.

Abacus views the boom in smart phones as one of the drivers that will need to be harnessed by travel companies intent on building a business in the online space.

Asia accounts for 43% of online usage, 3.1 billion mobile subscribers, 56% of the world’s 3G subscribers and more than 450 million mobile internet users.

Based on this rapid growth of online, ancillary services, mobile bookings and the resurgence of corporate travel, Abacus believes Asia is well poised to continue its strong growth of 2010 into 2011.

“In 2010, Abacus achieved its strongest year in terms of bookings since 2007,” said Mr Bailey. “We expect the figures to increase with Asia’s sharp growth in travel, although 2011 may be a year of cautious optimism for many.”

Abacus International VP marketing and VP India, Brett Henry, added, “2010 has been a record recovery year for many channels within the travel industry. Airlines have bounced back, corporate travel has picked up 20%.

According to the latest Abacus booking data, independent traveller bookings in Asia remained strong in 2010, up 11% from 2009. North Asia increased by 14 %, South East Asia by 8 % and South West Asia by 10 % year-on-year.

Asia Pacific international traffic accounts for 29.6% of the world’s RPKs, and set many new records in terms of passenger traffic. Asian aviation played a key role in the recovering global aviation industry, through its bulk of growth, speed of recovery and continued strength.

“Growth is the name of the game in travel at the moment, and although 2011 may not hit milestone figures like we saw in 2010, it will certainly be a year of growth with the emergence of Asia as the leading travel region,” stated Mr Bailey.

“Led by a slowing China and a growing India, in what has been aptly dubbed as slowing dragon and crouching tiger, Asia is well equipped and set to take the leap forward in establishing its dominance of the travel industry. It is important that we understand this evolving trend and are at the forefront to address any needs for the growing industry and to provide insight to our partners and customers,” he concluded.

Mr Kondic is an industry veteran with over 20 years of experience in the travel industry, having started his career with Qantas in Sydney, Australia.

He has also held senior roles in the airline business including Malaysia Airlines in Kuala Lumpur as well as travel agency, wholesale and content with Kuoni Travel and most recently with Gullivers Travel Associates, both based in Hong Kong.

Danny Kondic

Singapore-based Abacus International provides provider of travel solutions and services with more than 20,000 travel agency locations in 24 markets. The company is owned by a consortium of Asia’s leading airlines including All Nippon Airways, Cathay Pacific, China Airlines, EVA Airways, Garuda Indonesia, Dragonair, Philippine Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Royal Brunei Airlines, SilkAir and

Singapore Airlines, together with Sabre. See www.abacus.com.sg

ASEAN e-Travel Mart will be the fourth event in a series called “2012 Vision for Tourism Industry’s Technology” that will tour the country, kicking off 16 December, at Centara Duangtawan Hotel, Chiang Mai. Identical events will follow hosted at Novotel Phuket Resort Phuket, 9 February and Amari Orchid Pattaya, 23 February, leading up to the final event in Bangkok, 24 March.

All four events will be convened in the Thai language and participation at seminars, including the 24 March event in Bangkok, are free. Entrance to the travel mart component, 25 March, is also free, but sellers who book a booth at the mart pay US$1,000.

The Bangkok event should attract 500 participants mainly from tourism, software and technology sectors.

TTA estimates it will sell 50 booths – 25% to government sectors, 25% to IT companies and 50% to software and travel related companies.

TTA will need to raise Bt1.5 million to host the entire series. It is understood the Tourism Authority of Thailand, International Institute for Trade and Development and Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau will support the event financially, while Aseanta’s lends its support as a co-organiser.

In an earlier TTR Weekly report, TTA stated the Kasikorn Bank and Chaiyo Hosting were also supporting the four-part series.

TTA, which concentrates on improving technology skills in the Thailand travel agency market, was concerned that its grand finale in Bangkok needed stronger endorsement to attract attendance leading to a deal to co-brand it with the ASEAN Tourism Association.

To secure ASEANTA’s endorsement, TTA tweaked the content to include an opening presentation on “Electronic Standards for the ASEAN Tourism Association” and a discussion of the topic “The Next Step of Thai Tourism Industry once ASEAN is Unified” and “One Stop ASEAN Tourism.”

ASEANTA hopes to use the platform to recruit travel companies to sign up for its website www.southeastasia.org , which has fallen well short of its recruitment and revenue targets outlined at its launch during the 2009 Asean Tourism Forum in Hanoi, Vietnam.

After the ASEAN presentations, the Bangkok event will focus on digital marketing, future of search engine marketing, marketing your tourism business in today’s age, online payment for better cash flow and tourism distribution through mobile phones and tablets.

It is understood the Minister of Tourism and Sports, Chumpol Silapa-Archa, Tourism Authority of Thailand governor, Suraphon Svetasreni and International Institute for Trade and Development executive director, Weerasak Kowsurat, will attend and speak at the event.

Sellers need to book space before 15 March, 2011 for the travel mart component. Visit www.aseanetm.com/images/Factsheet.pdf

Possibly the world’s largest hotel group  across all categories budget to luxury, Accor is providing a link on its website whcih will allow visitors to see customer comments about its hotels posted on the independent TripAdvisor.

“In this way, our portal is improving services for Web users by supplying them with more information before they book our hotels and enabling them to share their impressions with other travellers after their stay,” said Accor deputy director of direct sales in charge of e-commerce, Romain Roulleau.

According to Accor Group, since launching in Australia, over 52% of Accor hotels have improved their ranking against their geographic competitor set and more than 11.5% of hotels increased their TripAdvisor ‘five-star’ ratings.

Hotel brands under Accor’s umbrella linked to this content service include Sofitel, Pullman, MGallery, Novotel, Suite Novotel, Mercure, Adagio, ibis, all seasons, Etap Hotel and Formule 1 hotels in all of the Group’s host countries.

Comments and opinions of previous guests will appear on accorhotel.com and on the TripAvisor website. However, a check shows the operation is not fully established.  At present, the service only works for a few hotels.

Just weeks earlier, TripAdvisor was the target of threats from some five-star hotel groups that claimed they were prepared to sue the website for hosting negative comments on their properties.

Such legal moves are unlikely to win hotel groups many friends, while giving TripAdvisor gains considerable free publicity on its role as an independent hotel review website.

TripAdvisor attended ITB Asia for the first time last October and ironically had a booth close to some of the hotel groups that were threatening legal action.

However, an executive at the show said, the website would not comment on any on-going legal action that was pending a court decision.

TripAdvisor is opening an office in Singapore by end of the year to help to expand its business model in the region.

The seminars, all in Thai language, will kick off 16 December and end 24 March 2011, the Thai Hotels Association advised members last week.

Following the style of a road show, the travelling seminar will be hosted 16 December at the Centara Duangtawan Hotel, Chiang Mai; 9 February 2011 at Novotel Phuket Resort, Patong beach Phuket; 23 February 2011 at Amari Orchid Pattaya and 24 March 2011 at Plaza Athenee Hotel, Bangkok.

TTA claims the events will help tourism executives to improve their skills so they will understand how to harness technology to grow their business.

The seminar will cover topics such as directions in the electronic market place, online payments and how to use technology to attract the MICE market. However, it is noted that the topics in each seminar might be adjusted according to regional requirements.

2012 Vision for Tourism Industry’s Technology is supported by Tourism Authority of Thailand, Kasikorn Bank and Chaiyo Hosting. For further information, contact 02 694 6500 ext. 106 or peyawadee@perfectconnection.co.th

Application can be downloaded at www.perfectconnection.co.th/v2009/form_semina.php?seminar=2&fs=3&type=rec

Introduced Thursday at a media briefing held at its Bangkok regional headquarters, Amadeus said the application allowed corporate users to quickly locate travelling employees in the event of an emergency.

Amadeus OneClick was developed over nine months starting last December and research with potential users suggested it should support what is legally termed “duty of care.”

It refers to corporate responsibilities that require a company to demonstrate adequate care for employees when travelling on business, particularly when travel is disrupted through circumstances beyond their control.

Most of the corporations giving us feedback asked for this feature,” said Amadeus Asia Pacific Business Solutions, regional director, Lisa Akeroyd.

“We are excited to launch the first locally developed corporate duty of care and reporting tool for our partners in Asia Pacific,” she told the media briefing. “Using Amadeus OneClick travel managers have access to the entire organisation’s travel information … and perhaps most critically, in the event of a crisis, they are able to communicate and locate employees to ensure their security.”

Amadeus already has a successful e-travel management solution that covers corporate travel planning, reporting and has tools to monitor compliance to a travel policy. It is used by 4,500 companies worldwide.

However, OneClick goes much further in presenting a bundle of monitoring and tracking tools under one application including an innovative SMS based tool that allows companies to be constantly in touch with their employees. There is also an interactive Google map that shows the location of employees according to the latest itinerary input.

Developed and launched for travel managers in Asia Pacific, OneClick rolled out first in Australia through a pilot project led by World Travel Professionals, based out of Brisbane.

The regional launch will also involve similar pilot projects recruiting a single travel management company in each of nine countries in Asia.

They include Australia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, India and Hong Kong.

By mid-2011, language specific editions will be launched for China, Thailand, Japan and Malaysia.

The major sales pitch for the new application is its ability to allow companies to track the whereabouts of their employees and post SMS alerts or warnings in the case of emergencies.

An Amadeus executive said it became apparent that there was a need for this service when five Amadeus executives were stranded in Mumbai during the November 2008 hotel bombings. He said it became difficult to determine if they were  resident in the hotel under attack or were staying at another property managed by the same hotel group.

“It was very apparent that we needed to know they were safe and the same feedback came from companies that provided input on what features should be included in OneClick.”

While touting the application’s merits on duty of care, Ms Akeroyd also insisted the application would save travel costs for companies through its sophisticated tracking and tools to measure travel policy compliance.

She was less forthcoming on the bottom line cost of OneClick to the end user. When asked for a ball park figure on pricing structure for an end user she said: “That’s confidential.”

So were the development costs to create the application, but at around nine months in the technology lab, Amadeus could claim a record for delivery to the market.

The next challenge will be to convince corporations they need to get up to speed on duty of care issues that are legally binding in the US and Europe, but less so in the Asia Pacific region.